I saw this this headline and I was curious if the expression "second headquarters" makes logical sense. To me a second major location cannot be "headquarters". Merriam Webster says (#2): " the administrative center of an enterprise". By definition, an enterprise cannot have 2 centers. What do you think?

At least they put some criteria out there other than "who can grovel at our feet the lowest and throw the most money at us".

While I'd love for the home town to be in the running, I'm personally thinking Atlanta, Dallas, or Denver. Of the three, I'd say Atlanta. It's got Delta, it's big and cheap enough, and finally, there's no point in having a second headquarters next to the first (still operating) one, and it's the farthest away from Seattle.

Pittsburgh actually makes the most sense in my opinion. The Pittsburgh Airport is grossly under utilized meaning that Amazon could have a large distribution operation from Pittsburgh. It was built to handle about 5 times it's current load. If you employee 50k people connected to Seattle, I'm pretty sure that they'll add a direct Seattle flight without much argument. Pittsburgh is where many of the Google, Apple and Amazon uber nerds come from (CMU is in Pittsburgh), and real estate is dirt cheap in Pittsburgh. Google and Uber have already made significant commitments to Pittsburgh, so there's already a precedent set for Pittsburgh as a high-tech hub. I know, people think of it as a blue collar town, but that image is at least 30 years out of date.

Quotejdc
I would think anywhere with snow or other unpredicatble adverse weather -- even like Phoniex's multiple days of 100+ weather -- would be a turnoff.

Snow isn't that big of a deal. There really aren't many places that don't have some adverse weather of one type or another. Pretty much Seattle and San Francisco are the only options by that criteria, but both are serious Earthquake risks. Atlanta has brutal heat and humidity. Chicago has tornadoes and snow. Every place has it's problems. Google had to establish a presence in Pittsburgh because too many of the people they wanted to hire didn't want to leave Pittsburgh.

Quotepdq
At least they put some criteria out there other than "who can grovel at our feet the lowest and throw the most money at us".

While I'd love for the home town to be in the running, I'm personally thinking Atlanta, Dallas, or Denver. Of the three, I'd say Atlanta. It's got Delta, it's big and cheap enough, and finally, there's no point in having a second headquarters next to the first (still operating) one, and it's the farthest away from Seattle.

Quoteztirffritz
Pittsburgh actually makes the most sense in my opinion. The Pittsburgh Airport is grossly under utilized meaning that Amazon could have a large distribution operation from Pittsburgh. It was built to handle about 5 times it's current load. If you employee 50k people connected to Seattle, I'm pretty sure that they'll add a direct Seattle flight without much argument. Pittsburgh is where many of the Google, Apple and Amazon uber nerds come from (CMU is in Pittsburgh), and real estate is dirt cheap in Pittsburgh. Google and Uber have already made significant commitments to Pittsburgh, so there's already a precedent set for Pittsburgh as a high-tech hub. I know, people think of it as a blue collar town, but that image is at least 30 years out of date.

Quotefreeradical
I just looked at some properties in Pittsburgh on Trulia, and property taxes are insane there.

What part? I haven't lived in the 'Burgh since the 80s, but I grew up in Mount Lebanon, which is/was an expensive area, but there were plenty of not-so-wealthy areas. Probably much like any urban area.

Quotevision63
They should choose some city with the best abandoned mall and make that bad boy headquarters.

Recently decomissioned Air Force Base with runways for heavy aircraft. I'm sure the warehousing and office space would be there too. Just needs to be close to a halfway decent program in computer science/software engineering.

Quotefreeradical
I just looked at some properties in Pittsburgh on Trulia, and property taxes are insane there.

What part? I haven't lived in the 'Burgh since the 80s, but I grew up in Mount Lebanon, which is/was an expensive area, but there were plenty of not-so-wealthy areas. Probably much like any urban area.

I don't know the area. However, I looked at what would be considered inexpensive housing. A $150K property might have property taxes that were half that of the mortgage payment. So, $500 for the mortgage, and $250 for the property taxes. That seems kind of crazy to me.

A $100,000 house is going to owe at least $3000 in property taxes annually in the Pittsburgh region, depending on the municipality (Pittsburgh the city is relatively small in size. Most of the Pittsburgh region is a patchwork of small municipalities.) Plus a 7% sales tax in Allegheny County. Oh, and don't forget the 1% school income tax on top of the 3% state income tax. I know because I write all these checks. (My taxes in Ohio when I lived there were probably half this all told.)

Amazon Corporate will be offered a sweet tax deal; the employees (and the rest of us) will make up the difference with paychecks.

I don't think Amazon could fit downtown unless they build themselves a new skyscraper, and even then I'm not sure where they'd put it. But there's plenty of room outside the suburbs for a new campus.

QuoteAcer
I don't think Amazon could fit downtown unless they build themselves a new skyscraper, and even then I'm not sure where they'd put it. But there's plenty of room outside the suburbs for a new campus.

But, that's not what Amazon is looking for. The majority of their target employees (as Google and others above have noted) like city living and the ability to get to work via mass transit or bicycle or foot.

So Alomono (the old LTV works in Hazelwood) would work, but I think the better location is Western Penn along the Ohio in Manchester. There's a ton of cheap housing stock in Manchester and Marshall-Shadeland that's ripe for rehab (like what Google employees are doing to East Liberty).

I'm not going to argue tax rates. I, too, like city living. For me, taxes are what I pay for municipal services.

Quotevision63
They should choose some city with the best abandoned mall and make that bad boy headquarters.

Recently decomissioned Air Force Base with runways for heavy aircraft. I'm sure the warehousing and office space would be there too. Just needs to be close to a halfway decent program in computer science/software engineering.

Unlike the mall, Amazon didn't destroy the Air Force Base. We have the Alameda Naval Air Station being reused for all kinds of interesting things. The runways are used for some things, but mostly have to remain empty since that's where Terns like to nest. The infrastructure is still there and is fun to explore. When I was in Sacramento recently, I glimpsed the remains of the former McClellan Air Force Base. Unfortunately, it's a SuperFund site. It's water wells have lots of hexavalent chromium in the mix (we remember that movie).

Quotepdq
At least they put some criteria out there other than "who can grovel at our feet the lowest and throw the most money at us".

While I'd love for the home town to be in the running, I'm personally thinking Atlanta, Dallas, or Denver. Of the three, I'd say Atlanta. It's got Delta, it's big and cheap enough, and finally, there's no point in having a second headquarters next to the first (still operating) one, and it's the farthest away from Seattle.

"Amazon last month reported that it has surpassed 341,000 employees globally, an increase of 110,000 in just the past year, not including temporary or seasonal staff. The company employs 40,000 people in Washington state, including about 25,000 people at its Seattle headquarters."

"DSA reports that Amazon in 2016 added 1.7 million square feet in downtown and surrounding neighborhoods. With another 3 million square feet under construction, Amazon will have a footprint of 10 million square feet in and around downtown by 2019, according to the report. That figure leaves out the big new Bellevue office Amazon is setting up."